2. headphones
  3. 168196-159850

So how much do you think the placebo effect impacts our listening preferences?

My hypothesis is that for ~%97 of us, the more a headphone costs the more we will enjoy the headphone.

My secondary hypothesis is that the more I told consumers a headset cost, the more they would enjoy the phones. i.e. a $30 headphone < $300 headphone < $3,000 headphones <<< $30,000 headphones.

I’m willing to bet that if I put the kph 30i drivers in the focal utopia’s chassis and told participants in this fake study that the phones cost $4k.... Everyone except for the 3%ers would never guess something was up. The remaining 97% would have no clue and report that it was the best set they ever heard.

Then if I gave them the kph30i and explained it was $30. 97% of people would crap on them after hearing the same driver in a different chassis.

My ultimate hypothesis is that build quality and price are the two most important factors in determining if people will enjoy a set of headphones. This how I rationalize the HD8XX getting crap on when only 3 people have heard it and publicly provided their opinion lol. "It’s a cheaper 800s, of course it’s going to sound worse!"

mikedangelo
danvignau's avatar
danvignau
935 posts
 
Anyone who does not believe in the placebo effect is fooling himself.  For me, much of the perceived effects of changes in systems from more expensive equipment can be attributed to this.  

The investigators had 82 men and women rate the pain caused by electric shocks applied to their wrist, before and after taking a pill. Half the participants had read that the pill, described as a newly approved prescription pain reliever, was regularly priced at $2.50 per dose. The other half read that it had been discounted to 10 cents. In fact, both were dummy pills.

Guess what happened. 


mahgister's avatar
mahgister
13,011 posts
 
Good example...

Thanks danvignau...

The placebo effect is constitutive part of any perception at some level, positively and negatively...

But using it to discard audio experience is no more ridiculous than  negating it and pretending to be objective in the absolute meaning of the word...

Placebo effect is too serious matter for audiophile or pseudo "objectivist"  alike...

For the value added by pricing to the S.Q. impression, it is a too common place evidence to be contested...But also depreciating small variation of quality by invoking always placebo effect is of no help here..

Only a personal strings of continuous listening experiments free us of the complete grip of  this necessary constituent part of any perception...

It is only my experience ....
nick1244
3 posts
 
I think its affects a little bit. Bythway, this discussion thread is great.
soix
9,456 posts
 
Anyone who does not believe in the placebo effect is fooling himself.
Ha! Priceless. Didn’t know Steven Wright was a member here.

Seriously though, the placebo effect is exactly why equipment reviews done without a comparison to another similar product are next to useless — yeah I’m looking squarely at you The Absolute Sound. Of course the placebo effect could still be at play even in doing product comparisons, but IMHO they go a long way toward at least mitigating it and the only reason for not doing them is pure laziness and/or a desire to crank out as many reviews as quickly as possible with little-to-no accountability for the accuracy of any assessments made therein. Really grinds my gears.

troidelover1499
253 posts
 
I enjoy reading this thread, some very thought provoking posts here.  Except for the headphone stuff, which is just dumb.
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